My little E-Grrrl looks like a princess—platinum blond hair, big blue eyes, porcelain skin and an abiding fondness for all things pink. However, lurking behind her delicate coloring and sweet disposition is a world-class klutz.. E-Grrrl moves with all the grace of a moth circling a light. She’s forever clipping things with her shoulders, tripping over cracks in the sidewalk, and stepping on toes. She’s a disaster at the dinner table, dropping food, staining her clothes, and overturning her drink. I’m confident she will be voted “Most Likely to Spill Champagne on her Wedding Day” when she graduates from college.

This is why when the school nurse called this morning, I recognized her voice immediately. We’ve spoken many times before. She has treated E-Grrrl at least a dozen times for bumps, bruises, and scrapes (including an incident where E-Grrrl poked herself in the eye on the playground). Interspersed with all the genuine complaints over injuries, headaches, and sore throats, have been a slew of others of a more dubious nature.

Let’s not call E-Grrrl a hypochondriac, let’s just say she’s in tune with her body and finds every irregularity fascinating. The nurse has listened patiently on many occasions as E-Grrrl has described her concern over a gushy feeling in her stomach, a pain in her chest, an achy leg, an itchy arm, or—my favorite—a case of dandruff.

So when I heard the nurse’s voice on the phone this morning, I didn’t know what to expect. Was E-Grrrl sick, injured, or just missing mom, a condition that often results in the rapid onset of mysterious physical symptoms?

The nurse explained that E-Grrrl wasn’t injured, but had backed into a shelf in her classroom, caught her pants on it, and tore a big hole  right in the seat. I didn’t know whether to laugh or cry. Good lord, that’s my Grrrl!

The nurse had scrounged up a pair of shrunken sweatpants for little E to wear but they only came down to her calves. I could imagine my girly-girl’s mortification. First she mooned her classmates, and then she was forced to wear some icky cast-offs that looked like Capri pants gone wrong. Did I mention that E left the house this morning wearing a pair of black Ugg clogs with yellow socks? You get the picture.

I knew this was a fashion emergency, and there wasn’t a moment to lose. I practically ran to catch the next bus with a pair of E-Grrrl’s pants gripped tightly in my hand. My mission: to save her from cold legs and school-wide humiliation at lunch and afternoon recess.

When I arrived at the school and beckoned E-Grrrl out of her classroom, she looked up at me with her big blue eyes and said, “Oh Mama, I knew you’d come!”

Of course, I would. That sweet thing wearing the short, short turquoise sweatpants and the clunky suede clogs—that’s my Grrrl. And me and the school nurse, we’re on her team—in sickness and in health.

© 2006 Veronica McCabe Deschambault

January 24, 2006